Transformers: Alone and Unafraid

[Dark Silver]

Grindstone had expected to be released in space while Deathstrike strafed a hole in the dreadnaught's side.

To find himself within the hanger of the vessal, to put it mildly, was slightly off setting, but he adapted. He didn't shake Shimmer off of himself, but he moved out, and towards the hanger door.

"We may still maintain the essence of surprise, if we move quickly enough." he said, covering the distance to the door swiftly so he could secure it.

"Your orders commander?"

[LadyTevar]

Shimmer was also very happy Deathstrike had been able to land inside the ship, rather than blast through. She let go of Grindstone, noted the escaping slaves, and rapidly calculated the options.

"The workers we saw running are not likely to inform a superior -- they'd rather avoid the beating they'd receive for abandoning post." The Fembot stated bluntly. "They'll see us as soon as someone thinks to look at internal sensors. Command is a straight shot that way, but we need to move now, before spotted by internal sensors."

[rhoenix]

Farshot fired and the shell flew doggedly through the void exploding at it's pre-set coordinates. Two of the missiles were taken down but the third had been approaching on a different vector and missed the explosion entirely. It continued on it's course racing after Farshot.

The shell slammed into the partially blinded ship and exploded. Causing additional fires to break out fed by atmosphere breaches from the ship. The last surviving missile sped closer to Farshot, it's zombie like cyberbrain tracking down the seconds of fuel it had against the rapidly dropping range. Not long now, not long at all. If it had emotion it would be filled with satisfaction.

Farshot dove toward the stricken ship, flying directly over one of the hot spots of a breach, and released his countermeasures before flying abruptly away from the capital ship at maximum velocity.

Meanwhile, he was studying his scans of the ship so far, and readying another shell. Once he lost this missile, he'd be able to fire a shell to ensure that ship wasn't going anywhere.

[Cynical Cat]

Deathstrike transformed into robot mode, the muzzle of Executioner gaping where his right hand normally was. Rage burned hell red in his optics. This was beyond contempt. This was pathetic.

"This is a launch bay. There should be of their warrior caste in charge and monitoring and who should have sounded the alarm. They have fallen so far that they have lost even the practical skills of war. Grindstone, lead us to their command center. Terminate all who resist." He gestured in the appropriate direction with the Mark III and set off in a rapid, distance devouring stride. The Decepticon warrior had no intention of leaving the vanguard of the assault entirely to Grindstone.

[Dark Silver]

"By your command," Grindstone spoke, as he stepped out of the door, and into the hall.

The Decepticon warrior had agreed with Deathstrike's initial observation, but kept silent on it. It worked in their favor for now, and Grindstone allowed that. After this strike, the GDE would not be so lenient in their tactics or shipboard discipline. Grindstone surveyed the hall, and noting the area and layout, did the most logical thing from that point forward to his mind.

His orders were clear, bring them to the bridge. Destroy any who opposed their path. While the job would be done in robot mode, the path could be most easily cleared in his vehicular form.

And such, was what he did. With in a second of being in the hall, his transformation cog engaged, clicked over into place, and the unmistakable sound of a cybertronian shifting forms filled the hall. Grindstone was not a small Cybertronian by any strech of the means, his legs and arms shifted closer to his body, as his center of mass shifted downward - his head receeded into his chest cavity, and the barrel of his main cannon extended outward. In the 29' robot's place stood a gleaming purple engine of destruction.

Treads engaged at that point, biting into the metal hallway, and propelling Grindstone forward, his anti-personel weapons scanning forward, even as the main cannon never shifted a millimeter from it's true heading.

As such, Grindstone lead the way as fast as the confines of the hallway would allow him.

[General Havoc]

Cavalier, like Grindstone, was a tank. Unlike Grindstone however, he did not judge this to be a prudent moment to demonstrate that fact. The inside of a Decepticon command ship was not the proper venue to transform into a war machine and to start firing hyper-velocity shells in every which direction. Even if they would not penetrate the outer hull, Cavalier's main guns would easily cleave through multiple bulkheads, pulverizing whatever organic slave might have taken cover behind them. Stuck as they were in the middle of a massive battle, many tens of thousands of relatively innocent organics would die today. That was war. But Cavalier did not see how that justified him adding to that number through the careless employment of five-inch KEPs. Not when he had other, more prudent options.

His voice stilled for once, his optics peering into the cavernous bay, Cavalier reached to his side, and drew a two-ton sword.

A terrible weapon was Cavalier's sword, thirty-eight hundred pounds of iron and anger forged into a blade of unfathomable cruelty. Thirteen feet long it was, tapered to a lethal point, with twinned cutting edges honed cruelly sharp by laser etchers and molecular re-alignment. As he drew it, valves from Cavalier's wrist connected to the hilt of the blade, and seconds later, the entire blade burst into flame like a torch, the flames burning a bright, fluorescent green as they wreathed the sword in a halo of light, casting flickering shadows over Cavalier's own olive-green paint. As he raised the sword to optic-length, from his other forearm extended a massive heater shield, shaped like a heraldic crest, nine-and-a-half feet tall and eight wide, painted the same dun green as the rest of Cavalier's body, save for the Autobot logo welded to its face. No lightweight construction of wicker and wood, Cavalier's shield was comprised of composite, face-hardened glacis plate, the strongest single piece of armor that Cavalier had at his disposal, ten tons of impenetrable protection against the worst that the Decepticons might have to offer.

Thus armed and girded with sword and shield alike, Cavalier struck off in the direction of the command center alongside Deathstrike and the churning form of Grindstone. What Grindstone proposed to obliterate here with his tank cannon, Cavalier did not know. This was going to be a close quarters fight after all. But whether Grindstone was doing this for looks or for effect or for some other damned reason perceptible only to himself, Cavalier, like Deathstrike, had no intention of leaving the vanguard of this particular assault to anyone else alone, let alone a Decepticon mercenary.

And besides, there was no telling what might be found on the bridge.

[LadyTevar]

It was always nice to be BEHIND the very well-armored and dangerous war-bots. At this point, Shimmer had even odds on being totally ignored in the background as fire would be concentrated on the obvious dangers of tank, huge gun, and even bigger sword. Still, she was prudent and activated her camo programs to make herself less noticeable. It didn't mean she didn't have her own weapon out, the arc-welder able to do nasty damage to organic or biomechanic.

"Deathstrike, what would the reactions be if this ship started broadcasting Retreat, adding that Skywarp has been identified amongst the enemy attackers?" Shimmer asked conversationally via the tacnet, although she was already figuring the answer. "By now Shunt has most likely been seen to teleport, and very few might remember he was ever activated."

Skywarp teleported. Skywarp was on the Nemesis with Megatron. If Skywarp was found....
Shimmer was already sure that the thought of *any* survivor from the Nemesis would frighten Stravous. There was already too much of a chance the GDE knew Deathstrike had joined Breakout, so he alone would not be a suitable boogieman.

"Of course, if they've already sent messages IDing us as Federation, the ruse won't work," she added. "But right now any confusion we sow will make Stravus cautious, and give us more time to upgrade our allies."
Of course, it could also trigger an all-out panicked attack on the FWA, although Shimmer rated that as unlikely. Stravus' little religion meant he couldn't just go destroy any evidence that Megatron might function, no matter how much he feared truth coming out. Also, that kind of attack left him open to Breakout.

Of course, the only reason her processor was even considering this was to stave off the nerves she was continuing to feel. They wouldn't go away until she was face to face with an enemy, she knew. One day Shimmer hoped to get over these nerves... while wondering if these cases of nerves was one reason she was still functioning.

[frigidmagi]

Elsewhere in the battlespace, Blastcap and 273rd Pioneers hurtled in armoured drop pods toward the wing command dreadnought selected as their target. Already the supporting elements of the League Fleet had battered aside its shields and destroyed or maimed a number of of its escorts, while missiles, gunboats, and strike craft distracted the enemy's point-defence grid. A wing of bombers had taken position ahead of the drop pods, to herald their arrival in grand style.

Over the comms, Blastcap briefed her unit, "Alright, boys and girls I'll only say this once, so listen up. This is a capture mission, but the target is the ship, not the crew. Anyone not trying to surrender is expendable. We're blasting our way in and advancing by fire. You are weapons free on heavy ordnance. If you encounter Cybertronians, call for back up and use any means available to keep them suppressed until I arrive. Our primary target is the command section, secondary targets are the power plants. Command is heavily armoured, so we're breaching the hull just outside it. We'll be outnumbered, but they'll be spread out through the dreadnought, do try to land on target. First we hit the bridge, then the operations room. Once command is secured we'll take the main reactor and have control of the ship. The the rest is up to Fleet."

Out in front, the bombers released their ordnance and broke off.

The torpedo loads of the bombers shattered the Dreadnought's shields and tore apart it's armor. The ship fell out of formation, it's fellows speeding by, attempting with utter desperation to run the gauntlet that Deathstrike had constructed for them. If they could break contact with the League fleet they could escape into FTL and flee with word of this magically appearing fleet of doom. This ship, however would not be doing so, it staggered, lamed and on fire as Blastcap's Pioneers latched on it and bore their way in. Blastcap found herself in a corridor easily of a size for a Cybertronian. Even Grimlock or Megatron would be comfortable on this ship.

-----

Meanwhile, Deathstrike's group advanced. The corridor was broad and long with side passages at regular internals. They had a moment of warning before the squad of Mechkhans came rushing into view. They stopped at a t shaped junction in the corridor, withing sight of the Cybertronians. Carrying infantry long guns and side arms they opened fire, the directed light of the weapons splashing warmly on Grindstone's armor. The dozen or so troops took up positions at whatever merger cover they could find and seemed to be set up to stay.

Farshot dove toward the stricken ship, flying directly over one of the hot spots of a breach, and released his countermeasures before flying abruptly away from the capital ship at maximum velocity.

Even in the frictionless vacuum of space, where one is free of gravity, velocity and attendant momentum do not just go away. At the way to close for comfort distance between Farshot and the missile, coutnermeasures only worked for a split second against the Limited Intelligence controlling the missiles. That said, given the rules of physics, a split second was all Farshot needed. The missile hot on Farshoot's exhaust simply was moving to fast to turn in time. Attempting to turn it slammed into the Capital ship with a violent impact, setting off it's warhead. Farshot found himself flipped end over end by the blast, his tail fins singed and the paint blasted right off.

[General Havoc]

Cavalier had not had a good couple of weeks.

It had begun on Corax II where Massacre and Division and a host of other 'cons had seen fit to barbeque an entire tribe of primitive organics for the fun of it. He'd taken his outrage out on those perpetrators of course, but he'd made the mistake of letting one go, only to find that he'd let that one off for more crimes than he had known originally. Then had come all the fun revelations before leaving the station. About Axis, Blastcap, and of course Deathstrike. He had been taken to task for being mean to Decepticons. He had been placed under the command of Decepticons, and forced to sit back and pay lip service to concepts he not merely hated but had been constructed with the express purpose of destroying. He had swallowed his pride, after struggles no living thing in the galaxy would ever appreciate, and forced himself to accept the orders of someone who represented everything he despised in the universe. The cost of such an action was one he had to pay with every tick of his processor, and had not gone away with time. He had responded by taking iron control over every action he took, his movements methodical and precise, as though he were afraid of what he might do if he opened up the throttle at all. He had been like this for weeks.

And then the Mechkhans, servitors of the Greater Decepticon Empire, began shooting at him, in their attempt to repel him from the ship on which they had taken hundreds and thousands of helpless organics as slaves. And in the one, infinitesimal instant that transpired between the first Mechkhan discharging his weapon, and the laser from that discharge striking Grindstone's frontal armor, Cavalier, without a sign or word to indicate it, released his hand from the brake lever, and transformed from a quiet, taciturn robot, into the Avatar of War.

He broke into a dead sprint, making no attempt to dodge or evade fire, his shield held out in front of himself like the prow of an armored train, as shots from the Mechkhan's weapons struck his frame. The lasers could no doubt have turned an organic creature to a flash of vapor, but to the ten-ton shield of solid tritanium that Cavalier brandished before him, they might as well have been flashlights. Other shots struck his legs, his head, but Cavalier's armored body was not for show, and the momentum he generated in his charge would not be stopped by anything short of the ship spontaneously detonating beneath him. Paying no mind to what the Mechkhans might hurl his way, he raced towards them with his shield in the air and his optics flashing green. The closest Meckkhan had enough time to realize that it was Cavalier's target and to fire one last desultory shot before Cavalier brought all thirty-eight hundred pounds of his razor-sharp tritanium sword down on the Mechkhan's head, and crushed it like a cockroach struck by a planetary body, the blow so hard that it carved a furrow right through the floor where the Mechkhan had been standing, leaving only the scattered pulp that had once been an armored warrior laying splattered over the ground it had previously occupied.

Cavalier didn't say a word. But then he probably didn't have to.

[Dark Silver]

Grindstone had taken the point, his armored frame filling most of the corridor they traveled down - the thought was simple to him - while he was well armored, armed and powerful in his Robot form, his armor and weapons were better concentrated in vehicle form to take on forward assaults, and the power granted by his treads biting into the metal surface of the hall was greater than on foot.

The wisdom of this paid off when the Mechkan squad appeared, and the first lasers struck his glacial plating. The weapons were powerful enough to take on anything the Free Legions had, but no self-respecting tyrant would equip his soldiers with weapons which could harm them...and that's exactly what Grindstone expected out of the Starvous and the traitorous Decepticons under his command in the GDE.

The lasers struck the armor plating, and glanced off, the energy dispersing as the armor plate barely registered a temperature difference from where the first laser struck. Grindstone was about to comment on the relatively weak energy weapons (though given enough time, even these weapons would do damage to Grindstone's armor and systems), when Cavalier rushed forward and dispatched the first Mechkan with a swing of his sword, also removing the bulk of the fire from Grindstone.

The transformation cog ticked over, and Grindstone transformed then, the dark purple colored tank quickly becoming the imposing mechanoid with a cannon erupting from his chest, a missile pod and smaller antipersonnel weapon mounted on his shoulders. In place of his right hand, the sword blade was once again present, and this time it glowed purple as Energon empowered it. His left wrist sprouted the Energon Emitter, which at that moment decided to present it's own function, as a glowing double headed battleaxe of pure Energon appeared. Grindstone wasted no time, for even as he was transforming, he was moving forward, and his stride quickened as he took Robot form - taking him into the thickest knot of the twelve Mechkans, a decreased power shot (powerful enough to hurt or kill the warriors, but not enough to damage the ship itself by Grindstone's estimates) from his chest cannon proceeding him, as he engaged the Mechkan with sword and ax.

[rhoenix]

Even in the frictionless vacuum of space, where one is free of gravity, velocity and attendant momentum do not just go away. At the way to close for comfort distance between Farshot and the missile, coutnermeasures only worked for a split second against the Limited Intelligence controlling the missiles. That said, given the rules of physics, a split second was all Farshot needed. The missile hot on Farshoot's exhaust simply was moving to fast to turn in time. Attempting to turn it slammed into the Capital ship with a violent impact, setting off it's warhead. Farshot found himself flipped end over end by the blast, his tail fins singed and the paint blasted right off.

Spinning helplessly in space for a few moments, Farshot fought to regain his balance. He'd managed to avoid the most dangerous part of a missile explosion, but not all of it. The repair-bots would probably not be happy with him once he got back, he thought darkly.

Even so, once he regained his flight path and got back up to speed, he launched another armor-piercing shell at the capital ship - this time, aimed at the main engine manifold. Once launched, Farshot banked away, curving around to cover Shunt.

[Cynical Cat]

Deathstrike had heavy armour, legs that could kick, feet that could crush, a fist that could bludgeon, and a cannon that could be used as a club. He advanced upon the Mekhans and did all those things.

[SirNitram]

"Scratch that ship. That causes blowback and it's a wreck." Shunt chuckled. "Shall we drop in on the ones messing with the planet, or remain up here, Farshot?"

[rhoenix]

"Scratch that ship. That causes blowback and it's a wreck." Shunt chuckled. "Shall we drop in on the ones messing with the planet, or remain up here, Farshot?"

Farshot was about to answer, and had in fact opened up his comm to respond, when he remembered how he was supposed to respond, now that he was part of a military. Locating the file he'd left for himself with notes on how to respond, he followed the procedure he'd transcribed. "Farshot to Deathstrike - Commander, assault craft have been pacified. Orders for Shunt and I, sir? We see several enemy targets assaulting the planet."

[LadyTevar]

Contact with the enemy at last, and Shimmer's nerves gave way, replaced by her processors hitting overdrive. Time slowed to micro-ticks as her sensors expanded to get as much data as possible.

tick Mechkan squad sets up barrier in corridor. Weapons useless against Cybertronians. Sensors sweeping aft.
tick Cavalier charges. Probability of others charging 90.6%. Weapon raising, painting target Mechkan. Possibility of rear pincher attack with Mechkan as decoy 60.435% and rising
tick Grindstone transform and charging, target blocked. Re-targeting, rotating back to corridor wall. Sensors sweeping for probable pincher attack from aft hall.
tick Deathstrike charging. No possible targets without chance of hitting ally. Weapon aim switched to fully cover back hall, sneak attack from rear 84.935% and rising.

Trusting the three warbots to finish off the Mechkans without incident, Shimmer stood guard over their afterburners, fully expecting the Meckhans to be an expendable decoy for the true attack by one of the ship's Decepticons. If she was wrong, there was still the fact three Cypertronians and a squad of Meckhan had made firing into melee dangerous as well as effectively blocked the corridor.

[frigidmagi]

Shimmer turned to face the way they had came sure that a rear attack was coming. In a way she was utterly correct. The Mechkhanals were sacrificial bait. Cavalier, Deathstrike, and Grindstone had barely hit the squad (already inflicting nearly 70% causalities in seconds) when the bulkhead to their left blew in slamming them with shards of metal. The Cybertronians turned to face this new threat only to see a large rail cannon strapped to a 4 legged cyborg, surrounded by more Mechkhanials. The cannon fired slamming right into Cavalier's shield knocking him through the right bulkhead (now behind him) and into the chamber beyond. The Mechkhanials opened fire on Deathstrike and Grindstone with their energy weapons.

It was about then that Farshot's message reached Deathstrike.

[General Havoc]

Cavalier weighed close to seventy tons. His shield alone was nine and a half, more mass than many transformers had in them. These numbers flashed through his head as the rail cannon strapped to the Cyborg lifted him off his feet like the most menial of organics and threw him through the air. The bulkhead at his flank simply exploded as he crashed headlong into it, sliding to a stop against yet another bulkhead, hard enough to bash a dent into it. Though he had no organic brain or balance center to knock out of alignment, a blow like that necessarily took a moment to recover from, and in the moment in question, Cavalier came to several conclusions.

One was that they had been expected.

Cavalier's shield was the toughest piece of armor on his incomparably tough chassis. It had held the shot (hence the incredible blowback). But a shot powerful enough to throw him off his feet was not some mere squad support weapon that an organic species might have laying in a cargo bay somewhere. There were warforged Decepticons who did not muster the firepower necessary to do something like that. Any non-Cybertronian struck with that sort of a shot would have been simply impaled. More than a few actual Cybertronians would have joined them.

So where in the Pits did it come from?

Decepticons were not in the habit of arming their slaves with hardened anti-Cybertronian weapons, not like that one. The risk of an insurrection, or even a single slave pushed beyond the breaking point, were too great. Issuing weapons like that to your troops, even if they were some kind of loyalist core that you had pieced together through bribery or threat, was way too dangerous for all but the most suicidal Decepticons. Even assuming that you had such weapons on hand for emergencies, equipping them to troops as a matter of course was a good way to see them used against you. Yet here, in practically no time at all, the Decepticons had managed to arm their defense forces with heavy anti-Cybertronian weapons. That could mean many things of course, but one of the more likely one was that they had been anticipated.

How that was possible, Cavalier didn't have time to consider, because right now, things were becoming interesting.

[Cynical Cat]

Deathstrike's reaction to the ambush was different from that of an Autobot and entirely predictable to anyone who knew him. He half turned and leveled his cannon at the rail cannon carrying Mechkanal. At the same time he received the communication from Farshot. His response was in concord with his action. "Kill them all."

Thunder roared and a new sun blazed momentarily into life and then died. This was war. Collateral damage was to be expected.

[General Havoc]

This was war. And collateral damage was indeed to be expected. But that didn't mean that Cavalier had to enjoy it any more than he did.

This entire operation grated at his lasercore like a rasp. He was a ground pounder, not some damned space pirate boarding vessels and butchering their helpless crews. Even if not everyone was helpless, this was not a venue he liked at all. He was supposed to have dirt and concrete under his treads, not the false pressure of artificial gravity. He was supposed to blast away with reckless abandon at targets miles away and twice his size, not fight constrained by his unwillingness to obliterate half the ship in one salvo. That Deathstrike would open fire, he knew before Deathstrike actually gave the order. There was nothing for that. Deathstrike would claim it was the exigencies of war. He might even be right.

It had to end.

Kicking pieces of debris off of himself, Cavalier clawed his way back to his feet, hefting his shield and sword once more. The rail cannon and the Mechkhans he left for Grindstone and Deathstrike. They were not a match for either one, let alone the two of them combined. This sort of brute slaughter was not his business.

So he would find things that were his business.

The door at the side of the room was locked, and Cavalier simply kicked it off its rails, smashing it against the far wall in an explosion of sparks and wall consoles. One or two of the Mechkhans, having tried to escape the destruction that Grindstone and Deathstrike were laying on them, stopped in surprise as he emerged. One even had the temerity to shoot him in the arm, though the laser barely marred the paint on his armored gauntlet. He cut two of them in half with a single slash, kicked a third one into next week, and smashed a fourth to jelly with his shield. And then he was past them, cutting back into the corridor that he and Deathstrike and Grindstone had been in before being so rudely interrupted. But rather than turn back to the two Decepticons, Cavalier turned back the way they had been facing before the ambush, and moved on towards the bridge alone, intent on ending this battle before it could get any more sanguinary via the most efficient means he knew, the annihilation of whoever was commanding this damnable warship.

[rhoenix]

Deathstrike's reaction to the ambush was different from that of an Autobot and entirely predictable to anyone who knew him. He half turned and leveled his cannon at the rail cannon carrying Mechkanal. At the same time he received the communication from Farshot. His response was in concord with his action. "Kill them all."

Had Farshot been in his robot mode, he would have smiled. He was fully in his element. As it was, he opened a scrambled comm to Shunt and Deathstrike. "Acknowledged - unleashing hell, commander."

"Shunt," Farshot said while calculating targets, "we do not have time to take out the orbital craft, or I'd clear them first. The best we can do is cut off any and all support they have, so let's see just how many of the capital ships we can stop. Go for their engines or sensor arrays."

With that, since he was more or less in the middle of the relative stampede of capital ships around him, he centered on his next target - a large, lumbering cruiser roughly 10 kilometers away. Doing a rapid active scan of the ship, he located the spot where a good armor-piercing shell of his could destroy or at least disable the engine.

He loaded an armor-piercing shell, and measured distance, velocity, and hundreds of other factors as he calculated the best path for the shot to not only have a better chance of avoiding defense guns, and strike the target dead-on.

He re-measured, recalculated to make sure, and fired.

[LadyTevar]

Having a bulkhead blast apart mere meters from you tended to scramble the processor slightly. It took a few ticks before Shimmer could do anything but think oh, the bulkhead... I should have thought of that.... I should have warned Deathstrike too...

Luckily, she was not trapped underneath the bulkhead, but she was at a great angle to not only hear Deathstrike's order, but to get temp-blinded by the nova of his weapon before her optics countered. She rolled away from the blast, rising to a crouch so she too could aim and fire at the ambushers.

[Dark Silver]

Grindstone was disappointed.

The Mechkan, while augmented, where to weak to be a threat to beings such as Grindstone, Deathstrike or Cavalier. He guessed even shimmer could have dealt with this group after a period - but it only meant that it would slow them down slightly on the way to the bridge.

Then the wall exploded outward, and Cavalier flew through a bulkhead into another room. Grindstone was caught offguard by the explosion, but not so much that he didn't bring his attention to it. Another squad of Mechkan were rushing through the breach, carrying some form of rail-gun like turrent.

It would be more challenging than the previous squad, but aside from the turrent, nothing they would not be able to handle in short order. Deathstrike had raised his weapon, and prepared to fire, and Grindstone looked away. Deathstrike's weapon would deal with the gun easily, and the squad itself shortly there after. It was then, that Grindstone heard more than saw, Cavalier making his way back into the hall, then run off....

In the direction of the bridge.

"Commander, Cavalier is proceeding to the bridge," the Decepticon Warrior grunted as several laser blasts struck his side. Cavalier was heading right for the bridge...where the traitors would be.... "I must provide back up."

That was all Grindstone said, as he moved forward, to follow the hotheaded, fool Autobot.

[frigidmagi]

Cavalier stormed forward, an angry metal god of war. He turned a corner and ran into a column of troops. The Platoon of Mechkhals skidded at the sight, as the officer in the lead cursed and screamed an distorted order. And the troops opened fire on Cavalier. In the back Cavalier could see about 4 Mechkhals setting up a missile tube.

---------

Grindstone was hot on Cavalier's heels when the ceiling fell in on him. He felt pain across his left shoulder as a pair of claws dug in. A slender black Cybertronian rode on Grindstone's back, it's red eyes blazing over a faceplate.

"Remember me Grindstone" grated an familiar voice.

-----------

Deathstrike mowed down the Mechkhals and the Remi Cyborg taking ineffective return fire. A trio of armored Mechkals leapt on him through the cover of their dying fellows and stabbed with him with energon blades in his legs, burning some of his armor.


---------------------------------------------

Farshot and shunt screamed through the fleet dodging point defense trying to pick a target. A com signal from a League ship reached them.

"We identified a command ship on your wing, coordinates incoming."

[Dark Silver]

Grindstone was expecting something - the Decepticons who commanded this ship by now knew there were intruders on board, and would not let the approach to the bridge go unchallenged.

He did not expect what occurred though. He expected a blast through a wall, a squad of Mechkan or other slave race, assault drones, anything, except for one of the traitorous DINOs to drop down on him THROUGH the ceiling, and land on his back.

Pain sensors flared as the claws dug into the thick armor of his hide, and he felt the weight on his back as his internal gyroscopic sensors attempted to correct for the new weight and the sword blade and energon projector were replaced once more with his metalshod hands......

Grindstone was already reaching back to grab the wrist and arm of the one riding him and shoulder throw it off him, when he heard the voice - though it did not halt his movement he was surprised. He did indeed remember the voice....

"Feral," Grindstone said without emotion, even as he moved backwards towards a bulkhead, intending to trap Feral between himself and the wall, while he wrenched the arm from it's owner's torso.

"You have one chance. Turn away from Starvous' heretical Empire and I will spare your Spark....." Grindstone spoke in the cold monotone as his own optics flared brilliantly for a moment.


---------------

Edit: Forgot Grindstone still had blade and energon projector out, instead of his hands. Post edited to make more sense and allow the movements described further into the post.

[Cynical Cat]

It is possible for a large and powerful warrior to deal with smaller opponents swiftly and decisively if he was willing to accept injury in return. Deathstrike possessed both the armour and the sheer bloodymindedness to employ such tactics.

He clubbed at one with his fusion cannon while reaching out to grab and crush a Mechkhal with his left hand. He lashed out with a kick at the third, to knock it down and then stomp it into wreckage. He would endure their stings. They would not survive his blows.